The Boston Red Sox won game 1 of the World Series against the Los Angeles Dodgers 8:4 in Fenway Park in front of their home crowd. The landlords shone again with two outs, while both Starting Pitcher did not enjoy a long evening.
Dodgers star Clayton Kershaw was on the Mound in match 1 of the World Series like last year. But unlike last year, he had problems early on. He allowed two runs on three hits and had to fight especially with his slider, which did not have the usual bite. Both RBI singles by Andrew Benintendi and J.D. Martinez were against Slider!
Benintendi, however, profited greatly from a mistake made by First Baseman David Freese, who misjudged a popup into Foul Territoy and dropped it. That would at least have prevented an RBI hit and probably changed the whole inning.
The guests, however, kept their composure and gradually came back against Chris Sale, whose pitch speed decreased steadily from the third inning on. Already in the second inning the left-hander made a first mistake: His fastball missed the inside edge and caught too much of the plate, so that Matt Kemp thanked him with a home run on the seats of the Green Monster.
Manny Machado finally equalized L.A. with the third Dodgers single in a row. The 2-2 lead did not last too long, however, as Martinez took a 3-2 lead with a hard (105.9 MPH) RBI double against the wall in Center Field. Again it was Kershaw’s slider who didn’t have enough break and stayed deep in the zone!
In the fifth inning both starters had to finish. First Sale said goodbye to Brian Dozier after a walk. The latter finally achieved the 3-3 equalizer after a sharp RBI ground out by Machado. In the lower half of the inning it was Kershaw’s turn. Surprisingly, he was allowed to play a third time against the opponent’s lineup, which was not advisable given his form.
Kershaw let Mookie Betts walk on base and then allowed a single from Benintendi – against his slider. Afterwards there was a walk for Steve Pearce, before manager Dave Roberts had an understanding and redeemed his Ace. With loaded bases Ryan Madson had a bigger challenge ahead of him and didn’t stand up to it – he scored two of the runs because he first gave a RBI-Fielder’s-Choice by Xander Bogaerts, then a RBI-Single with two outs to Rafael Devers.
To be fair, the Bogaerts At-Bat could have turned into a double play if Second Baseman Brian Dozier hadn’t been so incredibly slow at the turn.
After 1-2-3 innings in the sixth, the Dodgers threatened enormously in the seventh and loaded the bases. More than a Sacrifice Fly from Machado to 4:5 from the guest’s point of view did not get around, however. The Sox, on the other hand, made much more of their next big chance.
Benintendi opened with a Lead-Off-Ground-Rule-Double into the Left Field – a high Fly Ball jumped right next to the line into the field and from there onto the tribune. Martinez saw an intentional walk and with two outs Boston then brought Eduardo Nunez for Devers against left-hander Alex Wood. And Nunez finally hammered a somewhat hanging breaking ball onto the Green Monster to decide – again three important runs for Boston with two outs.
That should be enough, because the hosts were allowed to leave each other after two sovereign performances by the learned starter Nathan Eovaldi and Closer Craig Kimbrel.
Game 2 of the series rises in the night to Thursday (2.09 am live on DAZN), the Red Sox send David Price into the race, the Dodgers Hyun-Jin Ryu.
His hits were not always pretty, but Benintendi was not to be seen in this game (4-4) and always put the Dodgers pitcher under pressure. He embodied the intransigence that this team has shown throughout the season. He also scored three runs and is the first player ever to get four hits and three runs in his first World Series game. Apart from that, he is only the third Red Sox player with four hits in a World Series game. The others were Jacoby Ellsbury in Game 3 2007 and Wally Moses in Game 4 1946.
The popular question at Kershaw is always: Which Kershaw do we see? The good or the bad Postseason-Kershaw? In game 1 at least the latter was at the start. Kershaw didn’t have a good slider in his arsenal, but still threw it frequently – and was punished for it. He only managed 4+ innings and allowed five runs. Of course he had bad luck with his defense, but in the end an Ace has to do more than that.
This article was published without prior review by Major League Baseball.